We quickly learn in “Herblock: The Black & the White” that the legendary political cartoonist of The Washington Post never married, never learned to drive a car and generally ate both lunch and dinner in the Post’s cafeteria.

Richard Schickel, whose celebrated and prolific career spans 50 years, has been the film critic for Time and Life magazines, has written more than 20 books and has produced, written and directed numerous documentaries.

In addition to his new book, “Clint Eastwood, A Retrospective,” Richard Schickel is the author of definitive biographies of Elia Kazan, D.W. Griffith and Walt Disney. All told, he has written, co-written or edited 37 books. He has produced, written and directed an equal number of documentaries. His most recent film is “The Eastwood Factor,” premiering on Turner Classic Movies in May. His five hour history of Warner Bros, “You Must Remember This” premiered on “American Masters” in Sept, 2008, and his film about director Ron Howard ran on TCM later that year.

Among his other recent titles are “Spielberg on Spielberg,” “Charlie: The Life and Art of Charles Chaplin,” “Scorsese on Scorsese,” “Woody Allen: A Life in Film” “Watch the Skies,” a history of 1950s Science Fiction. His reconstruction of Samuel Fuller’s “The Big Red One” won several awards in 2004. He reviewed movies for “Time” from 1972 through 2008.

He holds an honorary doctorate from the American Film Institute and has been awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship, the British Film Insitute Book Prize, the Maurice Bessy prize for film criticism, thee National Board of Review’s William K. Everson award and the Telluride Film Festival’s Silver Medal for his contributions to film history.